Leeds Knights urged to get back to their 'best' for play-off battle with Hull Seahawks
HAVING guided Leeds Knights to play-off success once already during his tenure, Ryan Aldridge knows what is required to be successful in the NIHL National post-season.
Even though his team took three points from a possible four on the opening weekend of Group B games against Telford Tigers - and in doing so topped the group - he felt his team were below par.
This week has seen the Knights reminded of what has made them such a dominant force over the last four years in the UK second tier, a run of success that has brought five trophies, including three league championships.
Players formerly at other clubs have given an insight into what made the Knights so difficult to play against, in an attempt almost to get back to the basics of what their success has been based on.
But, as the saying goes, talk is cheap and it remains to be seen whether the words spoken in the locker room this week have the desired effect when they continue their play-off campaign against Hull Seahawks this weekend.
“It was a case of some boxes being ticked - we won our home game, got something on the road,” said Aldridge. “But we always talk about performances and I don’t think that we had the kind of performances that we should be having in the play-offs.
“I thought Telford played really well in both games and we just weren’t at our best, we weren’t ready to compete.
“We played well for some spells but over the course of the weekend I don’t think we played with the hunger that you need in play-offs.
“We’ve got some players in our locker room that have been on other teams and they have talked about what they thought of us when they were on the receiving end of us being at our best, how they think we’ve played.
“So we’ve talked about that a little bit to try and get that out of the group.”
On the challenge of facing a Hull team who come into tonight’s first encounter of the weekend smarting from a 6-1 loss at Milton Keynes Lightning last Sunday, Aldridge added: “They are a different breed since they brought their new goalie in and they’ve been winning a lot of games.
“I reckon it’s going to be six good periods of hockey and a typical play-off game and we’re looking forward to what is a big challenge.
“I heard a lot of real positives about MK and how hard they worked that night, but we’re not going to read anything into that result because Hull are a good team, regardless and they won convincingly enough the night before at home.”